GREEN ROOM (2015)

Studio:       A24
Director:    Jeremy Saulnier
Writer:       Jeremy Saulnier
Producer:  Neil Kopp, Anish Savjani, Victor Moyers
Stars:     Anton Yelchin, Imogen Poots, Alia Shawkat, Joe Cole, Callum Turner, Mark Webber, Eric Edelstein, Macon Blair, Kai Lennox, Patrick Stewart

Review Score:

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Summary:

A punk band becomes trapped inside a neo-Nazi nightclub after inadvertently witnessing a horrible crime.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

To make up for an unexpectedly cancelled booking and interview, recently-fired radio host Tad gets a show for struggling punk band The Ain’t Rights through his skinhead cousin Daniel. The band, whose members include Pat, Sam, Tiger, and Reece, play the gig at a remote neo-Nazi club in a forest outside Portland.

While packing up equipment after their set, Pat returns to the green room to retrieve Sam’s phone and discovers headline act Cowcatcher with a group of skinheads huddled around a young woman, Emily, with a knife in her head. In a panic, Pat hurriedly calls 911 before skinhead Gabe takes away the phone.

The Ain’t Rights are locked in the green room with Cowcatcher, skinheads Werm and Big Justin, and Emily’s distraught friend Amber. Outside, Gabe stages a stabbing between two movement members to divert the police. Club owner and group leader Darcy arrives to strategize with Gabe about handling the witnesses.

Gabe dismisses Cowcatcher. Werm proudly tells Pat that he murdered Emily before he too is dismissed. Big Justin keeps Pat, Sam, Tiger, Reece, and Amber held at gunpoint in the green room while Darcy and Gabe continue planning.

Through the door, Gabe instructs Justin to give the band his gun as a good faith gesture. The band holds Justin hostage as they barricade the door to protect themselves.

The club’s electricity is cut briefly so that Darcy can dismiss the remaining concertgoers. Darcy and Gabe give tainted heroin to Werm and Cowcatcher, which later kills them.

Darcy negotiates with Pat through the door. Darcy convinces Pat to turn over the gun. However, the exchange turns into a violent struggle when Amber sees through the door slats that the skinheads plan to set them on fire. Pat’s arm is repeatedly smashed and slashed before they are able to close the door again. Reece chokes out Justin during the fray, though Amber then slices open Justin’s stomach with a box cutter.

Darcy assembles Daniel and a skinhead crew outside. The band breaks a hole through the green room floor and discovers a hidden heroin bunker, explaining why the neo-Nazis are so desperate to control the site. Tiger retrieves duct tape that he uses to bandage Pat’s arm.

Pat, Sam, Tiger, Reece, and Amber venture into the club to look for a way to escape. Dog handler Clark releases a pit bull that mauls Tiger. Reece makes it outside, but is captured and stabbed before being left to bleed out. Clark releases his dog on Amber, but Pat forces the animal to flee by overloading the sound speakers with microphone feedback.

Pat, Sam, and Amber retreat to the green room. Daniel is sent inside to deal with them, but he joins the survivors when Amber reveals Werm killed Emily, who was secretly in a relationship with Daniel. Meanwhile, Darcy checks Daniel’s car and discovers Daniel planned to turn traitor and run away with Emily.

Daniel begins leading the others out of the club, but is suddenly killed by a skinhead with a shotgun. Pat, Sam, and Amber overpower the assailant and Amber recovers the shotgun.

The three survivors venture outside once more. Clark’s dog mauls Sam, prompting Pat and Amber to retreat to the green room where they devise another plan of escape.

Darcy tasks Gabe to oversee cleanup with young henchmen Jonathan and Kyle while he and Clark leave to dispose of the band’s van. Pat and Amber lay a trap and end up killing the two henchman. When Pat and Amber confront Gabe, Gabe willingly surrenders.

Fed up with the murderous outlaw life, Gabe agrees to find the police and reveal the crimes at the club. Pat and Amber let him go and Gabe keeps his word.

Pat and Amber find Clark, Darcy, and skinhead Alan staging a scene to make it look as if the band was responsible for all of the murders. Following a tense standoff, Pat and Amber shoot and kill Alan, Clark, and Darcy.

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Review:

Life on the road as struggling punk band The Ain’t Rights is far from the fashionable rocker lifestyle young musicians Pat, Sam, Tiger, and Reece probably had in mind.  Their lot consists of siphoning fuel from parked cars, sleeping in a fart-filled van, and splitting a $28 payday four ways.

Groupies, catering tables, and posh hotel suites are nowhere to be found in this scrabbling underground scene of pizza parlor performances and uninterested audiences with fewer people than the band.  There is, however, a green room.

Anxious for a paying gig, any paying gig, The Ain’t Rights spit another gallon of gas into their tank and head to a remote Oregon forest where they’ve been hastily added to open a show for a clubhouse full of neo-Nazis.  A tough crowd for sure, but the foursome is confident they can handle it.  That is until Pat and his pals inadvertently spy something they shouldn’t while packing up their gear.  Now the band is trapped in that green room, desperate for a way out against a gang of skinheads eager to eliminate any potential threat to their organization.

The telltale sign of a powerhouse thriller is an ability to remain riveting within a to-the-point premise not reliant on gotcha twists or sensationalized artifice to elevate suspense.  “Green Room” has that sign.  It has that power.  Summarized succinctly as a siege story, writer/director Jeremy Saulnier’s fierce film is deceptively uncomplicated in its outline, though labeling it as simplistic would be a mistake.

Saulnier’s screenplay is smart without trying to outsmart the audience and unpredictable without being unnecessarily one step ahead.  Similar storylines can be prolonged battles of willpower or weaponry between two distinct factions, but there is a psychological side to the physical feeling of tension in “Green Room.”  Adding intriguing character drama layers the fiction in an engaging way that other standoff films miss with strictly action-oriented setups.

Acting, atmosphere, and editing converge to birth a compelling cinematic story long before Pat and his band even book their ill-fated gig.  Sickly green tints to the shadows, pulsating rhythms hypnotically entrancing the score, every element is committed to weaving an immediate sense of danger infecting every inch of the setting, and each subsequent scene continues adding suffocating pressure to that dread.

Fraught with overwhelming fear from its opening moments, “Green Room” puts a knot in the pit of the stomach that is impossible to untie.  Only when end credits roll does the film finally grant permission to at last take a well-earned gasp of relief.

“Green Room” is just as clever at casting, particularly in the brilliance of having Patrick Stewart play white supremacist ringleader Darcy.  Someone such as Henry Rollins in the same role using the same dialogue would naturally be a different character, but part of that would be due to preconceptions based on his previous portrayals and particular physical stature.  Stewart inherently adds a depth of intellectual intimidation before uttering a single word.  He is fearsome for his cold, cunning, calculating mind, and his is a presence uniquely suited for presenting this personality in a very particular way.

Around the 60-minute mark, “Green Room” finally takes a breath before regrouping for the climax.  This moment of quiet character development is the first time a crack shows through the veneer of grisly realism that captivates and shocks for so much of the first hour.  Here the film settles into some structuring that employs callback conversations and other screenplay standards wobbling the immersion factor.  “Green Room” gets a little too traditional in its storytelling techniques during this stage, though making it this far before excusing the viewer to be taken out of the tension is still an impressive accomplishment.

Pick your preferred passé pull-quote from the Big Book of Film Critic Clichés to describe “Green Room” with a hyphen: high-octane, white-knuckle, tour-de-force, maybe even dust off thrill-ride.  Those phrases may be tired, but the film certainly isn’t.  “Green Room” is a satisfying stunner of almost unbearable suspense, expertly plotted and masterfully realized.

Review Score:  90

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